photo by: Sara Shepherd

No guns signs are posted on a side door of KU's Art and Design Building, as well as other buildings on campus, pictured in May 2015.

At the first University Senate meeting of the school year Thursday, leaders of KU’s various governing bodies shared some of their major charges for the upcoming year. Here are a handful of highlights from their reports:

• After announcing that the chancellor had approved the Senate’s Social Media Policy procedure recommendation with only “a few minor corrections,” University Senate president Michael Williams, professor of journalism, said one of the group’s most important focuses for the upcoming year was going to be guns. Specifically, an ad hoc committee will discuss and recommend best practices for when the day comes that weapons are allowed on campus, including inside buildings and classrooms. Williams said he hoped the committee would have a report by the end of the school year.

“For organization’s sake and for preparation’s sake, we’re hoping to have something ready for the university to embrace … a set of documents that are acceptable to all involved,” Williams said.

News to you? In case you missed it, recently enacted Kansas law does indeed say that government buildings can no longer ban concealed weapons without security measures such as metal detectors. I wrote this pretty extensive article about the issue back in May (“Kansas universities lack firm plan for concealed guns on campus, making some anxious“) and a little more shortly afterward when University Senate first announced its ad hoc committee (“University Senate forms committee to address guns on campus“).

• Faculty Senate president Tom Beisecker, associate professor of communications, said faculty want to take a closer look at the International Academic Accelerator Program, a 1-year-old initiative to recruit and international students to KU and support them when they arrive. Beisecker didn’t elaborate on Thursday, but at past university governance meetings, faculty members have complained that some students don’t seem to have the English proficiency they should, and also bemoaned the fact that — because KU partners on the program with a private company, Shorelight Education — some financial and other information about it is secret.

The Journal-World did try to get a copy of KU’s 15-year contract with Shorelight through an open records request. However, back in March 2014, Shorelight sought and won an injunction in Douglas County District Court barring the contract’s release.

• Student Senate Vice President Zach George said that diversity would be one of the biggest issues the Student Senate will be pushing this year, and leaders try to address it every chance they get in meetings with university officials. “This is not only a very important issue for our campus but also nationally,” George said.

• Staff Senate President Chris Wallace said he expected his group’s big discussions to involve weapons and potential changes to KU’s smoking policy.

Williams noted that the committees and charges were established back in June but that they’re fluid, and if significant new issues arise the Senate should add them to the list. A suggestion for at least one new charge immediately followed: parking. KU Parking and Transit redesignated a number of lots this year, and a lot of students and faculty aren’t happy about it, saying they have fewer — and insufficient — parking options. (Like, even more than usual.)

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Footnotes

• Some big KU alumni news from Thursday: President Barack Obama presented a National Medal of Arts to 1979 KU textile design graduate and visual artist Ann Hamilton. The medal is the highest award given to artists and arts patrons by the United States government, and Hamilton received hers in a batch of 11 artists that included writer Stephen King and actor Sally Field. Hamilton “uses time as process and material, and her work demonstrates the importance of experiencing the arts firsthand in the digital age,” according to prepared comments from the White House.

Hamilton’s unique, large-scale work was recently on display here in Lawrence, when she teamed up with her former KU teacher and textile artist Cynthia Schira for an exhibition titled “An Errant Line.” In the 2013 installation, the artists used digital tools to cast a new lens onto the unique architectural features and existing artworks at KU’s Spencer Museum of Art.

• The big Jayhawk Boulevard reconstruction project (which included replanting trees on either side of the roadway that, once they’re bigger, will form a tree canopy like the one KU’s main drag used to be framed by) is being [dedicated Friday, will remarks and a ribbon-cutting at 11:15 a.m.][9] on the Strong Hall lawn. KU also is using the event as an opportunity to celebrate the university’s 150th anniversary — and promises there will be no fewer than 1,500 cupcakes.

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Contact me

I welcome feedback and KU news tips, and as always I’m at 785-832-7187 on the phone, sshepherd@ljworld.com by email or @saramarieshep/@LJW_KU on Twitter.

[3]: http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2015/may/27/university-senate-forms-committee-address-guns-cam/